Shaking Things Up: New Shake It Off STEM Case | Gizmos (2024)

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The Bay Area of California is at risk of earthquakes and has just experienced a large earthquake. Your students take on the role of earth scientists to investigate earthquakes and develop an early warning system to detect earthquakes. They will learn about the properties of seismic waves and how they are detected and measured. They apply this knowledge to create an alert system that gives people seconds of warning and reduces casualties. After developing their alert system, students provide a summary to the governor to explain why their alert system should be used to protect the citizens of California.

Does that sound like an incredible earthquake teaching resource for science education?It’s our newest Gizmos STEM Case, Shake It Off: Seismic Wave Early Alert Systems, and it’s ready for your students.

Understanding earthquakes and plate tectonics

The Shake it Off STEM Case addresses many key concepts that help students understand earthquakes, plate tectonics, and types of seismic waves. There are seven major tectonic plates and about ten minor ones across the globe. Tectonic plate activity occurs due to the characteristics of deeper layers of the earth. The locations where tectonic plates meet are called faults, and earthquakes are more likely to occur at faults.

Earthquakes are caused by a release of pressure between shifting tectonic plates. This pressure release causes waves, which shake the earth as plates move through it. Waves that travel to the earth's surface shake the ground and anything on it.

Plate tectonics evidence drop-down menu.

That’s why early warning systems for earthquakes are so important. They detect seismic activities and ground shaking during an earthquake and alert the public to protect lives.

STEM Pro Robert de Groot: Unraveling earthquake mysteries with a ShakeAlert expert

To find out more about earthquakes and early warning systems, Gizmos Learning Designer Lauren Schetne, Ph.D., turned to a specialist in the field. Dr. Robert de Groot, a physical scientist with the USGS (U.S. Geological Survey) Earthquake Science Center, served as a subject matter expert. “We talked about ShakeAlert, earthquakes, seismology, what we know, what we don’t know,” said Dr. de Groot.

As a young child, Dr. de Groot experienced his first earthquake. “It was 1971, the San Fernando earthquake. It scared my parents, and that scared me more than the actual shaking,” he remembered. That sparked an interest in science. “I have a background in chemistry, but I’ve always been interested in earthquakes.” Currently, he is a physical scientist with the USGS Earthquake Science Center. He is also a ShakeAlert Earthquake Early Warning System operations team member based in Pasadena, California.

“One of the most important things about earthquakes that we can’t emphasize enough is that we can’t predict them. They’re going to happen,” said Dr. de Groot. “A place like California could have 50 earthquakes a day, but most aren’t felt. We can’t control earthquakes. It’s not a matter of if they’re going to happen, it’s when. But, most importantly, you can avoid injury and hardship by being ready ahead of time.”

Building early warning earthquake systems

“There are challenges around methods for studying earthquakes. We can’t directly observe earthquakes. We have to observe them in a remote sort of way,” said Dr. de Groot. The STEM Case worked to create an earthquake simulation for students that captured those challenges.

Movements of tectonic plates generate seismic waves, which travel either deep or near the surface of the Earth. Besides earthquakes, they can also be caused by volcanic eruptions, landslides, manufactured explosions, or even magma movement. There are devices that can sense the ground motion once an earthquake reaches the surface. Vibrations of the earth that occur as seismic waves of the earthquake are measured by seismographs. Time and height (or amplitude) of the waves can also be measured.

The science behind ShakeAlert: Detecting earthquakes and delivering rapid alerts

ShakeAlert, which is the West Coast early warning system, works on principles of earthquakes that scientists have known for years, such as how they behave and that they occur inside the earth. Seismographs detect and measure earthquakes showing that there are different types of waves released by an earthquake. P waves move by compression and travel faster than S waves. S waves are transverse waves.

Early Alert Systems (EAS) can be designed to receive information in the form of electromagnetic waves from seismographs. If seismographs send information to the EAS once a P wave is detected, citizens will receive more warning that an earthquake is coming.

Seismograph recording drag and drop

Visualizing data

“The critical thing to note is that ShakeAlert is not earthquake prediction, but it actually detects an earthquake as soon as it reaches the surface,” said Dr. de Groot. “The real innovation with ShakeAlert is the ability to move that information very quickly from where it detects that earthquake in the field and process that information at one of the three processing centers. We have one in Southern California, another one in the Bay Area, and a third one near Seattle. That information is taken and processed in a matter of seconds. The idea is to make information available about the earthquake’s location, size (magnitude), and also the estimated shaking around that earthquake.”

A ShakeAlert message is a data package with this information that is handed off to third parties, such as Google, transportation agencies, and hospitals. They take that data and decide where they should be delivering alerts. Dr. de Groot said, “It’s an important partnership between USGS, which is the data, and the partners who decide and deliver those alerts. The goal is to prioritize getting alerts to systems and people who could feel the strongest shaking first.”

“We talk about things in your earthquake preparedness toolbox. Early warning is another tool in that toolbox, and everyone should have the opportunity to use it,” said Dr. de Groot. “Don’t abandon the other things that you’re already using, like knowing what to do if you feel shaking or having an emergency supplies kit or having an out-of-state emergency contact.”

The Shake It Off STEM Case: Turning earthquake education upside down!

The alert system used in this Gizmos STEM Case was modeled off of the ShakeAlert System, which was developed by the USGS. Dr. Schetne worked with Dr. de Groot to create an alert system that mimicked the current state of alert systems and to ensure the accuracy of the content. ShakeAlert System operates in California, Oregon, and Washington. Dr. de Groot said, “It serves over 50 million residents and visitors and is the only early warning system in the United States currently. It’s modeled after other early warning systems around the world, but it’s most closely designed to the Japanese system, although we have several features that are quite a bit different.”

Communicate scientific reasoning

The main earthquake used as a scenario in the STEM Case was based on the 1989 Point Loma earthquake, also known as the World Series Quake. For an ELA connection to primary sources, actual interviews of people who experienced the earthquake are included in the STEM Case.

“I always found the experiential side of actually doing the experiment rather than just reading about it to be much more valuable. So, having that immersive experience, I think, is critical,” said Dr. de Groot.

What else? Through the earthquake activities in the STEM Case, students in grades 6-8:

• Develop a system using scientific knowledge, and refine their system as they progress through the case.
• Analyze seismic waves and alert data to refine their alert systems.
• Test design solutions and modify to improve solutions based on test results.
• Communicate their findings in writing in a summary to the governor to explain why their alert system should be used in the state.

Wave Basics

Types of Waves

STEM Cases help students work like scientists. Dr. de Groot noted that it’s important for students to see, “how scientists think about these things, and dispel the notion scientists have a magic want. It really just requires hard work, training, study, time, and patience.”

Are you ready to bring this interactive learning experience to your students? Everything you need is right here.

Access STEM Case